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Observation of end-to-end pumping in a quasiperiodic Fibonacci-type photonic chain

Arnob Kumar Ghosh1,*,†, Ang Chen2,*, Ashraf El Hassan2, Patric Holmvall1, Mohamed Bourennane2, and Annica M. Black-Schaffer1

  • *These authors contributed equally to this work.
  • †Contact author: arnob.ghosh@physics.uu.se
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Phys. Rev. Research 8, 033347 – Published 22 September, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/vxx3-l3h4

Abstract

End-to-end pumps utilizing edge-localized states offer a promising route to operate as connecting buses, supplying efficient and robust connectivity between non-neighboring elements in a network. Here, we investigate a finite quasiperiodic Fibonacci-type photonic chain and demonstrate its ability for end-to-end pumping, with only small and simple changes to the system. First, we use a tight-binding formalism to numerically show that a localized pumping state can be transferred between opposite ends of the system, with only a small structural change to the chain. Then, we experimentally implement this end-to-end pump in an array of coupled optical waveguides, where light propagation is effectively described by the tight-binding model under the paraxial approximation, enabling direct correspondence between theory and experiment. We numerically simulate and experimentally demonstrate pumping by injecting light into a single waveguide at one end of the setup, which activates a localized pumping state. As the light propagates along the waveguide array, it is also pumped to the other end. We further show that pumping remains robust against structural deformation, such as controlled defects in the waveguide array. Our results establish that quasiperiodic Fibonacci-type photonic lattices are a robust and experimentally viable platform for disorder-resilient state transfer.

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Phys. Rev. Research 8, 033347– Published 22 September, 2026
  • Received 13 May 2026
  • Accepted 19 August 2026
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